24 Nov Announcing Placester’s Series C
Placester announced its Series C today – a $20M round led by NEA, which also led the Series B. This round brings the company’s total capital to over $50M. Placester enables the professionals who power residential real estate – real estate agents and brokers – to leverage the power of technology for the benefit of their businesses. With this round, we are truly the best-positioned company (capital and customers) to fulfill this mission at scale. Our partnerships this year with Keller Williams and Remax – the 2 largest real estate brands – are a testament to how the real estate industry (which is the largest industry in every city and state in this country) has embraced us.
What I really want to express, at the risk of sounding prolix and not profound, is my love for the founding team at Placester. Matt and I connected instantly when we met nearly 5 years ago. We both inspect the world like chess players, with a lot of thought put into both long-term strategy and shorter-term tactics, looking for the slightest advantage that turns a draw into a win. You can always see the gears turning in his head. A deep mutual trust and respect underlies our discussions, which has allowed our relationship to be rock-solid and constructive for the growth of the company, especially at critical inflection points. Working closely with someone like Matt has been energizing.
Matt is fortunate to have Fred (aka Superman) as a foil. I’ve seen few founding teams that work as well together as Matt and Fred do. They are A+ at what they do individually, and A+ at how they do it together. They have a very synergistic relationship in terms of both execution and communication. They’re never content with themselves and with each other, which drives them to push harder without interfering with each other. It’s these interpersonal traits – and the complementarities of the same – that often matter more than any particular content expertise.
Placester’s founding team is a very Boston one. Both Matt and Fred went to BU. Both are very sharp. Very ambitious. But they are also very down to earth, almost to a fault. We hardly ever talk about financing or valuations (and certainly not of exit) – we just stay focused on the business. Leading Placester’s seed and Series A rounds felt like a natural output of the business we were building together.
That being said, it was a West Coast venture firm with which we chose to partner as we grew to a later stage. NEA’s commitment to Placester has been exceptional. They see the same growth and opportunity we do, and along with their experience, possess a combination of openness and humility I rarely see in the large venture firms that are their peers.
We’re going back to work for the next couple years, but today is a day to celebrate a culture of getting shit done and of staying humble.